放天灯 (Sky Lantern)

During our trip to Taipei, Rachel and I travelled to Ping Hsi (平溪) to release a sky lantern. According to the tourist pamphlets, the Shih Fen (十分) area used to be coal mines and are tucked in remote mountainous area not easily accessible by transportation. In order to let their family members know they have safely arrived at the coal mines, the miners will release these sky lanterns.

Over time, the releasing of these sky lanterns became a custom to seek for blessings and well-wishes from above.

Here are the photos documenting our journey to experience this tradition. 🙂

When we got off the train at Ping Hsi, the area was pitch dark although it was only slightly past 8pm. Most of the shops were closed and the lights in the residential dwellings were mostly switched off too.

Here’s what the place looks like in general:

There’s also a large creepy mural painting depicting various scenes of how to be a good citizen sprawling a full five metres wall.

Rachel and I were very hungry at this point as we have not eat anything since around 12 noon and the cold wind, coupled with light drizzling rain does not make it better for us. Hence when we saw a sole desert shop still open, we dashed in.

A kindly granny greeted us and serve us with sweet potatoes and yam balls. They were damn delicious! It’s probably because we were starving. I am not sure, but for that moment, those simple balls tasted like the best cuisine in the world for us.

Granny’s store also sell fruits. They look good too, but we have to rush off as we have to catch the last train back at 9pm and we have yet to achieve our objective of releasing a sky lantern.

Along the way, we encountered a few provision stores like the one below, offering sky lanterns for sale.

For some inexplicable reason, we settled for this hardware store below: